No! Oh good god, no!

My brother and I (whole family, really) are big fans of zoos. In fact, when I was in England, of all the places I could have gone for a day I chose to go to the London Zoo--that didn't pan out, but it was my first choice instead of, say, Buckingham Palace or Big Ben. We've talked about expanding our repertoire of zoos from the local one to others that are... kinda close. Couple hours away. One of them was the Cincinnati Zoo.

That may not happen now.

The Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden and the Creation Museum have made a joint marketing agreement and are selling "combo tickets" to get into both attractions for one price.

From the Cincinnati Zoo's website (link available from PZ's article):

This holiday season, save more by visiting two of the areas fantastic attractions. Cincinnati Zoo and the Creation Museum. Ticket is valid for one day regular admission to each attraction plus the holiday events PNC Festival of Lights (Nov. 28-Jan.4) and Bethlehems Blessings featuring a live Nativity scene(Dec 12 Jan. 4)

Save more with our new Combination Attraction Ticket:
Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden and Creation Museum The Creation Museum, located seven miles west of the Cincinnati Airport, presents a walk through history. Designed by a former Universal Studios exhibit director, this state-of-the-art 70,000 square foot museum brings the pages of the Bible to life.

I am truly distraught.

[Edit] Whew! Looks like that's been scuttled. Now I can go there with a clean conscience.
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Return of denialism kills

Not just AIDS denialism, either. Vaccine denialism can kill. As can homeopathy and/or naturopathy:

A healing therapist died after a minor injury went gangrenous because his 'inner being' told him not to see a doctor, an inquest has heard.

Russell Jenkins shunned conventional treatment for his foot injury after he trod on an electrical plug at home.

...

Mr Jenkins, who ran the Quiet Mind Centre from his home in Southsea, Hampshire, injured his foot in December 2006 and developed an 2cm-long ulcer.

In April 2007, Mr Jenkins, a diabetic, sought alternative advice from homeopath Susan Finn, who suggested he treat it with Manuka honey.

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Denialism kills

Gee, you ignore overwhelming scientific consensus on an important issue and things turn out badly. Who'd've thunkit?

A new study by Harvard researchers estimates that the South African government would have prevented the premature deaths of 365,000 people earlier this decade if it had provided antiretroviral drugs to AIDS patients and widely administered drugs to help prevent pregnant women from infecting their babies.

The Harvard study concluded that the policies grew out of President Thabo Mbeki's denial of the well-established scientific consensus about the viral cause of AIDS and the essential role of antiretroviral drugs in treating it.

Coming in the wake of Mr. Mbeki's ouster in September after a power struggle in his party, the African National Congress, the report has reignited questions about why Mr. Mbeki, a man of great acumen, was so influenced by AIDS denialists.

...

For years, the South African government did not provide antiretroviral medicines, even as Botswana and Namibia, neighboring countries with epidemics of similar scale, took action, the Harvard study reported.

The Harvard researchers quantified the human cost of that inaction by comparing the number of people who got antiretrovirals in South Africa from 2000 to 2005 with the number the government could have reached had it put in place a workable treatment and prevention program.

They estimated that by 2005, South Africa could have been helping half those in need but had reached only 23 percent. By comparison, Botswana was already providing treatment to 85 percent of those in need, and Namibia to 71 percent.

The 330,000 South Africans who died for lack of treatment and the 35,000 babies who perished because they were infected with H.I.V. together lost at least 3.8 million years of life, the study concluded.

Epidemiologists and biostatisticians who reviewed the study for The New York Times said the researchers had based their estimates on conservative assumptions and used a sound methodology.

"They have truly used conservative estimates for their calculations, and I would consider their numbers quite reasonable," James Chin, a professor of epidemiology at the University of California at Berkeley's School of Public Health, said in an e-mail message.

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Friday Dead Racist Blogging: Fuck You, Ben Stein Edition

One of my interests is the war waged against the theory of evolution by ignorant creationist hordes. I don't blog about it much because I'm not a biologist (of course I'm not a historian either, but that doesn't really stop me from bloviating on certain subjects). Demonstrating why creationist caricatures of evolution are, well, just that--caricatures--is somewhat beyond me.

However, creationists do not limit themselves to attacking the theory of evolution on its scientific merits. They often will also (or even solely) attack it for what they consider its implications to be, as in the mockery of a documentary that was released today, Flunked--I mean, Expelled. They will say, for instance, that Darwin was a horrible racist and that the theory of evolution itself is horribly racist (for instance, it leads directly to the Holocaust, says Ben Stein).

Biology I may know little about. But dead racists? Now the ball's in Farnsworth's court!

If we are to consider whether Charles Darwin was a racist, and whether the hypothesis he proposed is also racist, we should examine it not from today's standpoint, but from the standpoint of the mid-nineteenth century. What was the state of science and race back then?

For a long while, people had wondered how the separate races of man had come to be. The ancient Greeks had pondered the issue of what made black men, black, and generally concluded that it was the result of climate:

The story of Phaëton's driving the chariot sun wildly through the heavens apparently served as an explanation for the Ethiopian's blackness even before written records, and traces of this ancient fable were still drifting about during the seventeenth century.

The Æthiopians then were white and fayre,
Though by the worlds combustion since made black
When wanton Phaeton overthrew the Sun.

Less fancifully, Ptolemy had made the important suggestion that the Negro's blackness and woolly hair were caused by exposure to the hot sun and had pointed out that people in northern climates were white and those in temperate areas an intermediate color.¹

This idea was perhaps the prevailing scientific opinion on the question of the origin of races even centuries later:

In general, the most satisfactory answer to the problem was some sort of reference to the action of the sun, whether the sun was assumed to have scorched the skin, drawn the bile, or blackened the blood. People living on the Line had obviously been getting too much of it; after all, even Englishmen were darkened by a little exposure. How much more, then, with the Negroes who were "so scorched and vexed with the heat of the sunne, that in many places they cursed it when it riseth." The sun's heat was itself sometimes described as a curse--a not unnatural reaction on the part of those Englishmen who visited the West African coast where the weather was "of such putrifying qualitie, that it rotted the coates of their backs." This association of the Negro's color with the sun became a commonplace in Elizabethan literature; as the Prince of Morocco apologized, "Mislike me not for my complexion,/ The shadow'd livery of the burnish'd sun,/ To whom I am a neighbour and near bred."²

This seemed reasonable, but one ran into a problem when it became apparent that very different races existed in very similar climates across the globe...

Unfortunately this theory ran headlong into a stubborn fact of nature which simply could not be overridden: if the equatorial inhabitants of Africa were blackened by the sun, why not the people living on the same line in America? Logic required them to be the same color. As Ptolemy's formidably authoritative Geographica stated this logic, "Reason herself asserts that all animals, and all plants likewise, have a similarity under the same kind of climate or under similar weather conditions, that is, when under the same parallels, or when situated at the same distance from either pole." Yet by the middle of the sixteenth century it was become perfectly apparent that the Indians living in the hottest regions of the New World could by no stretch of the imagination be described as black. They were "olive" or "tawny," and moreover they had long hair rather than the curious wool of Negroes; clearly they were a different sort of men. ... Clearly the method of accounting for human complexion by latitude just did not work.³

...or that one race could span across many different climates...

We will, therefore, abstain from any further details, in order not to extend these remarks beyond the limits of general statements, and would only add one fact respecting the American Indians; as this race presents a most remarkable feature in the point of view under consideration. It has been satisfactorily established that over the whole continent of America south of the arctic zone (which is inhabited by Esquimaux), all the numerous tribes of Indians have the same physical character; that they belong to the same race, from north to south, and that the primitive inhabitants of the more northern or southern regions. In this case we have the greatest uniformity in the character of the tribes of an entire continent, under the most different climatic influences.⁴

Further, it was reasoned that if climate or environment effected a change in people, then putting people of one race in the region generally inhabited by people of another, then they or their descendants should gradually change to resemble the natives. That is, whites who lived in Africa should be transformed into blacks, blacks who lived in Europe should become white, and whites who lived in America should become Native Americans. But this was absurd--who had ever heard of such an occurrence?

How can a reasonable man believe that any thing short of a miracle, could, in the temperate parts of Australia or America, change the white race into Australians or Indians. Both reason and fact are opposed to such a supposition. Observation and history alone can settle these points, and we have no record of such changes having occurred, or being now in progress.⁵

And again,

No one ever saw a Negro, Mongol, or Indian, born from any but his own species. Has any one heard of an Indian child born from white or black parents in America, during more than two centuries that these races have been living here? Is not this brief and simple statement of the case sufficient to satisfy any one, that the diversity of species now seen on the earth, cannot be accounted for on the assumption of congenital or accidental origin?⁶

No-one had ever heard of anything like a black man turning into a white one, or a white person giving birth to a black person (as an aside, it amuses me how much the above paragraph matches current creationist talking points). And studies had shown that the races existed perfectly unchanged thousands of years ago; Josiah Nott made numerous references to Egyptian monument which he alleged showed the races as they exist today, being just as distinct four thousand years ago. In fact, this image appeared in his book Types of Mankind:

Later on that page he writes "although the effigies we present are small, they portray a specimen of each type with sufficient accuracy to show that four races were very distinct 3300 years ago."⁷ If the races had remained unchanged for thousands of years--as far back as Bishop Usher had dated the Flood, and even before that! If the earth had only existed for so many thousands of years, how could one possibly think that the races had been diversified into the types present today in the minority of that time, yet remained unchanged for the majority of it? As Louis Agassiz put it, "five thousand years ago the negroes were as different from the white race as they are now, and that, therefore, neither time nor climate nor change of habitation has produced the differences."⁸

No, the conclusion that scientists came to was that the races had always been distinct:

[I]n 1846 ... [Samuel] Morton sent an account of his collection of crania to the newly formed American Ethnological Society. Emboldened by the work of his colleagues, here for the first time publicly, he clearly set forth his conclusions concerning the origin of races. Although he had already seen enough of the material Squier and Davis had turned up to be convinced that the Mound Builders were of the same race as the modern Indians, he did not believe that the Indians and the Mound Builders were descended from a single pair. On the contrary, he believed "that they have originated from several, perhaps even from many pairs, which were adapted, from the beginning, to the varied localities they were designed to occupy. . . . In other words, I regard the American nations as the true autochthones, the primeval inhabitants of this vast continent; and when I speak of their being of one race or of one origin, I allude only to their indigenous relation to each other, as shown in all those attributes of mind and body which have been so amply illustrated by modern ethnography."⁹

The human races, they theorized, had been created separately and specially adapted to the areas where they were found, much as they supposed animals were:

The circumstance, that, wherever we find a human race naturally circumscribed, it is connected in its limitation with what we call, in natural history, a zoölogical and botanical province,--that is to say, with the natural limitation of a particular association of animals and plants,--shows most unequivocally the intimate relation existing between mankind and the animal kingdom in their adaptation to the physical world. The arctic race of men, covering the treeless region near the Arctics in Europe, Asia, and America, is circumscribed in the three continents within limits very similar to those occupied by that particular combination of animals which are peculiar to the same tracts of land and sea.

The region inhabited by the Mongolian race is also a natural zoölogical province, covered by a combination of animals naturally circumscribed within the same regions. The Malay race covers also a natural zoölogical province. New Holland, again, constitutes a very peculiar zoölogical province, in which we have another particular race of men. And it is further remarkable, in this connection, that the plants and animals now living on the continent of Africa, south of the Atlas, within the same range within which the negroes are naturally circumscribed, have a character differing widely from that of the plants and animals of the northern shores of Africa and the valley of Egypt; while the Cape of Good Hope, within the limits inhabited by Hottentots, is characterized by a vegetation and a fauna equally peculiar, and differing in its features from that over which the African race is spread.

Such identical circumscriptions between the limits of two series of organized beings so widely differing as man and animals and plants, and so entirely unconnected in point of descent, would, to the mind of a naturalist, amount to a demonstration that they originated together within the districts which they now inhabit. We say that such an accumulation of evidence would amount to demonstration; for how could it, on the contrary, be supposed that man alone would assume new peculiarities, and features so different from his primitive characteristics, whilst the animals and plants circumscribed within the same limits would continue to preserve their natural relations to the fauna and flora of other parts of the world?

If the Creator of one set of these living beings had not been also the Creator of the other, and if we did not trace the same general laws throughout nature, there might be room left for the supposition, that, while men inhabiting different parts of the world originated from a common centre, the plants and animals now associated with them in the same countries originated on the spot. But such inconsistencies do not occur in the laws of nature.

The coincidence of the geographical distribution of the human races with that of animals, the disconnection of the climatic conditions where we have similar races, and the connection of climatic conditions where we have different human races, show, further, that the adaptation of different races of men to different parts of the world must be intentional, as well as that of other beings; that men were primitively located in the various parts of the world they inhabit, and that they arose everywhere in those harmonious numeric proportions with other living beings, which would at once secure their preservation and contribute to their welfare.¹⁰

In short, their theory held that "as a question of natural history, the investigation of the human races leads to the idea of a diversity of their origin, rather than to the supposition that they have originated from a common stock."¹¹

But it was more than just that different races had separate origins. The proposition of polygenesis held that they were completely different species, and ought--nay, must--be treated as such. For instance, the races were said to have different brain sizes, and therefore different levels of intelligence¹²:

That race appeared immutable meant that the characteristics attributed to the races--namely, inferiority, stupidity, laziness, and an incapacity for civilization in blacks--were also unchangeable.

If, then, the negro races stand at the lowest point in the scale of human beings, and we know of no moral or physical agencies which can redeem them from their degradation, it is clear that they are incapable of self-government, and that any attempt to improve their condition is warring against an immutable law of nature.¹³

This meant, to some at least, that the black man must be kept in slavery:

What disposition God, in his providence, will eventually make of these blacks, cannot be foretold; but it is our duty to provide for our own happiness and theirs, as long as we can. In dealing with this question, it will not do to be guided by abstract notions of liberty and slavery. We can only judge the future by the past; and as experience proves that the negro is better off in slavery at the South, than in freedom elsewhere, it is the part of philanthropy to keep him here, as we keep our children in subjection for their own good.¹⁴

And guess what demolished the idea of polygenesis? That's right--Darwin's theory of evolution.

"One good effect is already manifest," [Asa Gray] announced. Darwinism rendered irrelevant "the hypothesis of a multiplicity of human species." So far from providing for plural creations of man, Darwin described a process which made it possible to derive all categories of life from an original one and placed the organic kingdom on a self-sustaining basis. Or, as Gray put it, "the very first step backwards" into the Darwinian past "makes the Negro and Hottentot our blood-relations."¹⁵

Darwin himself was a monogenist¹⁶, and predicted that as a result of the acceptance of evolution, "the dispute between the monogenists and the polygenists will die a silent and unobserved death."¹⁷

One of the most widespread tactics used when setting up a group as something to be discriminated against, to be reviled, to be eliminated--indeed, it may be absolutely necessary to accomplish this--is to dehumanize them. You must ensure that people think of that group as "them" instead of "us", so you must rob them of our shared humanity: refer to them as animals, as a disease, as monsters, as demons, as barbarians, anything that prevents people from accepting them as human. This is key to getting people to go along with your plans for them. Evolution, however, definitively settled that all the races of man are indeed human, and that a man of one race is far more similar to a man of another race than he is different. It is very much anti-racist, especially when compared to the prevailing scientific attitudes of the time in which it was first presented.

1. Winthrop D. Jordan, White Over Black: American Attitudes Toward the Negro 1550-1812, pp. 11-12
2. Ibid., p. 13
3. Ibid., pp. 13-14
4. Louis Agassiz, "The Diversity of Origin of the Human Races", The Christian Examiner and Religious Miscellany 44
5. Josiah Nott, "Unity of the Human Race," Southern Quarterly Review, vol. 9, no. 17, January 1846
6. Josiah Nott and George Gliddon, Types of Mankind, p. 58
7. Ibid., p. 85
8. William Stanton, The Leopard's Spots: Scientific Attitudes Toward Race in America 1815-1859, p. 106
9. Ibid, p. 97
10. Agassiz, "The Diversity of Origin of the Human Races"
11. Ibid.
12. Nott and Gliddon, Types of Mankind, p. 450
13. Josiah Nott, "Nature and Destiny of the Negro," De Bow's Review, vol. 10, March 1851. This was originally a lecture by Nott, entitled "Natural History of Man Viewed in Connection with Negro Slavery."
14. Ibid.
15. Stanton, The Leopard's Spots, p. 186
16. Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, pp. 181-82
17. Ibid., p. 184

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Not to mention paying the participants with food coupons

In most instances where people cry "What about the Tuskegee Experiments!?" I tend to tune them out.

However....

Scientists using federal grants spread fertilizer made from human and industrial wastes on yards in poor, black neighborhoods to test whether it might protect children from lead poisoning in the soil. Families were assured the sludge was safe and were never told about any potential risks.

Nine low-income families in Baltimore row houses agreed to let researchers till the sewage sludge into their yards and plant new grass. In exchange, they were given food coupons as well as the free lawns as part of a study published in 2005 and funded by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

...There is no evidence there was any medical follow-up.

Comparable research was conducted by the Agriculture Department and Environmental Protection Agency in a similarly poor, black neighborhood in East St. Louis, Ill. Residents there also were not told of the potential risks.

...

However, there has been a paucity of research into the possible harmful effects of heavy metals, pharmaceuticals, other chemicals, and disease-causing microorganisms often found in sludge.

A series of reports by the EPA's inspector general and the National Academy of Sciences between 1996 and 2002 faulted the adequacy of the science behind the EPA's 1993 regulations on sludge.

The chairman of the 2002 academy panel, Thomas Burke, a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said epidemiological studies have never been done to show whether spreading sludge on land is safe.

"There are potential pathogens and chemicals that are not in the realm of safe," Burke said. "What's needed are more studies on what's going on with the pathogens in sludge - are we actually removing them? The commitment to connecting the dots hasn't been there."

It seems that, instead of doing preliminary, basic studies to see whether spreading sludge on lawns might be safe for people, they just skipped straight to testing on poor black families--and apparently didn't even do a medical follow-up. That's abhorrent.

Via aimai, via LG&M.
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The free market fairy is probably held up somewhere else

Witness the free market in action!

The Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA) allows herbal and non-herbal supplements to be sold in the US without demonstration of effectiveness or safety. Despite recent improvements in Good Manufacturing Practices required of supplement manufacturers, these products still pose significant risks to the population simply because the hands of regulatory authorities are tied - products cannot be removed from the market until there is evidence for lack of safety, meaning that consumers must first be harmed before FDA is authorized to intervene.

Observe how it solves all our consumer woes with its invisible, magical hand:

The FDA notified healthcare professionals and patients that it has found hazardous levels of selenium in samples of certain flavors of the dietary supplement products "Total Body Formula" and "Total Body Mega Formula." Analyses of samples by FDA have found most of the samples contain extremely high levels of selenium -- up to 200 times the amount of selenium indicated on the labels of the products. The FDA has received 43 reports of persons from nine states who experienced serious adverse reactions using these products. The adverse reactions generally occurred after five to 10 days of daily ingestion of the product, and included significant hair loss, muscle cramps, diarrhea, joint pain, deformed fingernails, and fatigue. Consumers should stop taking the products and consult their healthcare professional if they experience any adverse events associated with the use of the products.

Lament those who would try to break the finger of the magical, invisible hand of the free market with their regulations and safeguards:

The Coalition [to Preserve DSHEA] is described as, "a non-profit coalition comprised of major suppliers of dietary supplement products and services, as well as leading industry trade associations and other supporters." This organization is also behind the website, SaveOurSupplements.org, to "protect your access to safe, effective, & affordable dietary supplements."

Safe? Effective? Neither of these attributes are required by current legislation. So please don't insult us by implying this is the case.

Affordable? Now I see. Preventing any requirements for prospective demonstration of safety or confirmation of supplement content would certain cut into profit margins.

Silly Pharmboy. Don't you know that if you demand that things aren't poisonous, then production costs will go up, and therefore things will cost more? Just ask Erin Burnett:

And that's why the free market fails.
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Not that those of you who read this blog even know about this

Richard Dawkins has a review of Expelled up. My favorite bit is probably this:

[Ben] Stein has no talent for comedy, as he demonstrates in a weird joke about scratching his back, which falls completely flat.

Well, we already knew that about Stein. But there's more:

But his attempt to do tragedy is even worse. He visits Dachau and, when informed by the guide that lots of Jews had been killed there, he buries his face in his hands as though this is the first time he has heard of it.

It sounds like it's not only a disgusting "Darwin was a Nazi!" propaganda piece, but a truly abominable piece of film-making as well.
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If the government can steal your money, how is it there are PYGMIES + DWARFS??

Oh my god! A creationist--but for taxes!

But think for a moment. Were you actually present when the 16th Amendment was ratified? Or were you not yet born, like me? Unless you were actually present for the entire process, you really have no way of knowing whether it was properly ratified, you only have documentary evidence to go on. And that requires trusting a whole laundry list of interested parties, most of whom we will all remain unaware of.

Isn't that brilliant reasoning? Makes me want to try it out myself. Here goes!

But think for a moment. Were you actually present when your father was born? Or were you not yet born, like me? Unless you were actually present for the entire process, you really have no way of knowing whether he was really born, you only have documentary evidence to go on. And that requires trusting a whole laundry list of interested parties, most of whom we will all remain unaware of.

It's conclusive! This troll couldn't possibly exist, because there's no evidence that his father was ever born. I mean, sure, there are "birth certificates", but those are used by the government. And since the government has done some bad things, therefore everything that any government bureaucracy ever prints immediately becomes suspect. All evidence that supports the clear fact that his father was never born has been locked away by "interested parties" that "we will all remain unaware of"... because they're invisible! And all evidence that contradicts the obvious truth of the non-existence of this alleged person's father was forged by evil government officials bent on destroying people who dare to attack the evil establishment!

Isn't logic fun?
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Since he doesn't believe in the 1st amendment either, this is even more worrisome

In addition to Huckabee, Brownback and Tancredo (even though he dropped out of the race), it seems that Ron Paul also doesn't believe in evolution. Ed Brayton has a video, but I'll provide a partial transcript here, after being asked -- I think -- about the time at the Republican debate that the candidates were asked whether they believe in evolution and whether it should be taught:

Well, first, I thought it was a very inappropriate question, y'know? For our--for the presidency to be decided on a scientific matter. And I, uh, I think it's a theory--theory of evolution. And I don't accept it. Y'know? As a theory. But I think the creator that I know, uh... y'know, created us, every one of us, created the universe. And the precise time and manner, and, uh, and all.... I-I just don't think we're at a point where anybody has absolute proof on either side.

Well, no. Nobody has "absolute" proof. But then again, that's an completely unreasonable goal, and a standard to which no other field of science is held. So no, we don't have "absolute proof". What we do have is a brobdingnagian amount of evidence, including thousands of fossils, showing time and again gradual changes between species; the similarities in form and genetic make-up that all point to common descent; countless studies and published and peer-reviewed papers; innumerable predictions that would be expected if evolution were true and were later confirmed.

And on the other side? We have a bunch of whining twits who've elevated a millenia-old book of fables to the flawless template from which all knowledge must be stamped, and whose biggest objection to evolution is that they don't understand it.

Gee. I wonder which one we should teach our kids?
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Wherein I weep for my state

On behalf of Kentuckians, I am so sorry:

Each day near Petersburg, Ky., 1,500 to 4,000 visitors, including busloads from Christian schools and churches, stand in line for as long as an hour to wander 60,000 square feet of animatronic exhibits presenting the Bible's creation story as fact.

It's been six months since the Creation Museum opened to crowds and protests, and the controversial attraction has proven more popular than even organizers had predicted.

Halfway into its first year, it is on the verge of surpassing its projected yearlong attendance goal of 250,000. Officials now expect nearly 400,000 people to pass through the doors by year's end.

"It's been a surprise," said spokeswoman Melany Ethridge, who attributed it to the dramatic exhibits and ongoing media interest from Europe and elsewhere.

At least 10,000 people have paid for year-round access. In the past week alone, it has attracted visitors from France, Brazil, Japan and Hong Kong. The museum did not have a demographic breakdown of visitors, and still relies partly on donations.

I can understand going once to see it. Heck, my brothers and I all wanted to go and see it--just to laugh at them--but refrained because we also didn't want to give them money. (Incidentally, I have to wonder how many of the visitors were also of the point-and-laugh persuasion). But who on earth requires a season pass? Why would Ted Schulz of Louisville go twice? Creationists constantly crow that religion is constant whereas science changes (the former being good, the latter bad), so why would you ever have to visit a vacuous dump like that more than once? It will never change. They have all the facts now--they've remained the same for 6000 years--and nothing new need ever be added! Why the hell would you go a second time?
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If the entire scientific community and you come to opposite conclusions, that's not proof that you're right

A little bit ago Greta Christina wrote a post discussing what she called the Galileo Fallacy:

There's a form of very bad thinking that I see a lot in some very smart, thoughtful people.

The thinking goes like this:

"Great thinkers throughout history have had unpopular ideas that everyone disagreed with.

"I have an unpopular idea that everyone disagrees with.

"Therefore, I must be a great thinker."

I call it the Galileo Fallacy, in honor of something my old roommate Adele used to say: "The fact that everyone disagrees with you does not make you Galileo."

This "argument" is very common among cranks, people who believe: homeopathy; reiki; the moon landing was faked; 9/11 conspiracies; HIV doesn't cause AIDS; etc. I felt that Ms. Christina's post would be better served if a concrete example was offered:

This subject is attended by the same difficulty which has impeded the advancement of other departments of Natural History, as well as the Sciences of Astronomy and Geology. In their infancy, discoveries in these sciences, were regarded as inconsistent with the Mosaic account of the creation, and they have encountered determined opposition from well meaning and other religious persons. The scientific men who have been bold enough to speak truth, and to uphold the works of God, have been persecuted by those who mistake their own intellects for a measure of wisdom, and their own passions and prejudices for the will of heaven.

When Gallileo [sic] promulgated the great truth that the sun stands still, and the earth moves round it, he was attacked and persecuted by the whole priesthood--he was twice brought before the Inquisition and forced to renounce his doctrines.--Time, however, has served to show that Gallileo was right, and the Bible still stands "the rock of ages."

What was "this subject" that could be so favorably compared to Galileo's theory of heliocentrism, under attack as it was by an overwhelming conspiratorial organization dedicated to oppressing new ideas? The idea that blacks and whites weren't the same species. The quote was taken from Josiah Nott's "Two Lectures on the Natural History of the Caucasian and Negro Races". Some of Nott's ideas that he thought made him the 1844-era Galileo:

1st. That the mulattoes are intermediate in intelligence between the blacks and whites.

2d. That they are less capable of undergoing fatigue and hardships, than the blacks or whites.

3d. That the mulatto women are particularly delicate, and subject to a variety of chronic diseases.

4th. That the women are bad breeders and bad nursers--many do not conceive--most are subject to abortions, and a large portion of the children die young in the southern States.

5th. That the two sexes when they intermarry, are less prolific than when crossed on one of the parent stocks.

6th. That Negroes and mulattoes are exempt in a surprising degree from yellow fever.

Yeah. Time isn't going to prove that you were a brave martyr fighting for truth against the dogmatic establishment if you're simply wrong.
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Well, yeah, that's what I said, but what I meant was....

Michael Behe--author, hack, and Intelligent Design advocate (but I repeat myself)--once said that in order to prove to him that an "irreducibly complex" system evolved naturally, he would need to be shown not only a complete step-by-step list of mutations,

...but also a detailed account of the selective pressures that would be operating, the difficulties such changes would cause for the organism, the expected time scale over which the changes would be expected to occur, the likely population sizes available in the relevant ancestral species at each step, other potential ways to solve the problem which might interfere, and much more.

Which, of course, is more detail than any other scientific principle, and a hell of a lot more than they require for I.D. About the only person who would require more evidence is Kent Hovind, who offers a phony $250,000 challenge to prove to him that evolution is true. How does one do this? By recreating the Big Bang in a laboratory. And it's a good thing that Behe requires all this information to accept that "irreducibly complex" systems can evolve, or else he'd realize that he himself has already proven that they can do so.

But let's ignore their double standards for now. O happy days, there's a new paper out that actually gives all this information! So, naturally, Behe has dropped all his objections, shut down the Uncomment Descent website, and apologized to all biologists for wasting their time up until now, right?

Of course not. He was given all that evidence and declared that it's proof of intelligent design instead. Ah, well.
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Of course, by Christian math, this means that there is one gay gene

A week after the fact, I find this open letter to "sharp-minded antihomo" Judy Paris. No idea who she is? Eh, neither do I. Doesn't matter.

Here's part of the open letter that I wanted to focus on, because it brings up one of Paris's "arguments":

I'd like to point something out, though. When you note that "[m]ost scientists agree that it is unlikely that there is a single 'gay gene'," you equate this observation with an absence of a genetic contribution to homosexuality.

Uh, yeah. About that...

On Sunday, the Tribune published a rebuttal by Simon LeVay, a neuroscientist and leading researcher in the study of sexual orientation and its origins. LeVay is clear in exposing the deliberately deceptive nature of [David Clarke] Pruden's opinion piece.

Employing a turn of phrase calculated to confuse any reader, Pruden writes that a recent genetic study from the University of Illinois "reported that there is no one gay gene." That's correct - it reported evidence for three! How does finding three "gay genes" rather than one show that the born-that-way theory of homosexuality has "no basis in science," as Pruden argues?

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Liars for Jesus

So apparently some (well-funded) crackpots are making a movie, Expelled, about how intelligent design is being shunned by scientists, some sort of conspiracy by Big Science to keep the edgy, new theory from getting its due hearing.

Okay, fine. Typical martyr-posturing by the I.D. / creationist / fundie crowd. And, to rub salt in the wound, they're releasing it on Darwin's birthday in 2008.

Except...

Unlike some other documentary films, Expelled doesn't just talk to people representing one side of the story. The film confronts scientists such as Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, influential biologist and atheist blogger PZ Myers and Eugenie Scott, head of the National Center for Science Education. The creators of Expelled crossed the globe over a two-year period, interviewing scores of scientists, doctors, philosophers and public leaders. The result is a startling revelation that freedom of thought and freedom of inquiry have been expelled from publicly-funded high schools, universities and research institutions.

The thing is, they didn't do this as the makers of Expelled; they came up to PZ saying they were making a movie called Crossroads, about the intersection between science and religion.

So they lied about what they were doing to show what good Christians they are. Sounds about right.
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Now I know what causes crop circles

James Randi, by this lady's logic.
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I have no credentials to be speaking on this issue!

Denialism Blog has a post up, Why do people believe in conspiracy theories? This is a topic that's come up quite a bit in my house lately--specifically with regard to those who don't believe we landed on the moon--so I thought it might be of interest. One thing that they highlight that may be significant is this:

So what kind of thought processes contribute to belief in conspiracy theories? A study I carried out in 2002 explored a way of thinking sometimes called "major event - major cause" reasoning. Essentially, people often assume that an event with substantial, significant or wide-ranging consequences is likely to have been caused by something substantial, significant or wide-ranging.

I gave volunteers variations of a newspaper story describing an assassination attempt on a fictitious president. Those who were given the version where the president died were significantly more likely to attribute the event to a conspiracy than those who read the one where the president survived, even though all other aspects of the story were equivalent.

To appreciate why this form of reasoning is seductive, consider the alternative: major events having minor or mundane causes - for example, the assassination of a president by a single, possibly mentally unstable, gunman, or the death of a princess because of a drunk driver. This presents us with a rather chaotic and unpredictable relationship between cause and effect. Instability makes most of us uncomfortable; we prefer to imagine we live in a predictable, safe world, so in a strange way, some conspiracy theories offer us accounts of events that allow us to retain a sense of safety and predictability.

But I also found this very interesting:

Age is not the only demographic to influence conspiracy beliefs. Several US studies have found that ethnic minorities - particularly African and Hispanic Americans - are far more believing of conspiracy theories than white Americans. In our recent UK study, we found a similar race effect, coupled with an even stronger association between income and belief levels. People who describe themselves as "hard up" are more likely to believe in conspiracies than those with average income levels, while the least likely to believe are the well off.

How can we account for the link between race, income level and conspiracy theories? Theorists tend to show higher levels of anomie - a general disaffection or disempowerment from society. Perhaps this is the underlying factor that predisposes people more distant from centres of power - whether they be poorer people or those from ethnic minorities - to believe in conspiracies.

Essentially, societal disempowerment increases the probability of belief. One could read this two ways. First, that disempowerment leads to coping mechanisms to protect one's ego. You're not poor and powerless because you are unintelligent, or are lazy, or some other simple explanation. It's because the man is keeping you down. The system is against you. A perceived enemy at odds with you is easier to face than one's own defects.

A second explanation - that the wealthy and elite are no more rational than the disempowered, but because of their status, they have no desire to rock the boat.

In comments, someone offers a third possibility:

Third explanation: you are poor and disconnected, so you don't have access to education and trustworthy information, you cannot develop a rigorous, scientific way of thinking or a stock of general information for checking facts, and, ultimately, you believe the first load of BS you receive, because you cannot detect it.

And someone else touches on something that occurred to me in relation to the point in the main article:

It seems to me that most (if not all) of the wildest theories preface their particular version with stories about past government lies (or theories about lying). As if to say...'see, they've done it before'

For instance, when Spike Lee appeared on Real Time With Bill Maher in October, 2005, he (and Maher, to a degree) defended the wild theory that the government conspired to blow up the dams by pointing to other things that have gone wrong. A partial transcript:

Maher: And this past Saturday, Louis Farrakhan did a kind of reunion of the Million Man March--I don't think we got a million people this time. But, uh, he was saying, last Saturday in Washington, that he thinks that the federal government--there was a conspiracy to actually blow up those levees so that they would flood the poor, black districts in New Orleans. I have to tell you, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, I don't believe it. But, when you see some of the things that have gone on in this country....

Lee: Exactly. It's not far-fetched.

...

Michel Martin: We can all understand, anybody with any knowledge of history can understand why a lot of people would feel this way. That that's a reasonable theory.

Martin also disagreed with the theory but prefaced her remarks with the above conciliatory message to Lee. And when she objected, Lee brought up the 2004 elections--"If they can rig an election, they can do anything!"

But furthermore, Lee went on to say that because blacks have traditionally suffered at the hands of whites, this theory was not beyond the pale, specifically bringing up the Tuskegee Experiment when another guest, Tucker Carlson, objected (and I never thought I'd be rooting for Tucker Carlson):

Lee: We're in L.A. And there's an emergency situation. We call from Beverly Hills, and we call from Compton, which one the cops coming to first? [Here the audience applauded]

...

Lee: [To Carlson, after he objected] With the history of this country... have you ever heard of the Tuskegee experiment?

...

Lee: I don't put anything past the American government when it comes to people of color in this country, I'm sorry.

To Lee, the fact that black people suffered--and continue to suffer--at the hands of larger society was proof enough that this conspiracy theory was feasible. So I might add that a fourth option is: those who are societally disempowered have learned to fear and distrust the power structure that shuns and rejects them and, because of their past experiences with the system, are willing to believe anything bad about it; that it has no limits.

It may also be that those who are disempowered tend to overestimate the power of the system, for any number of reasons (simply because they are not a part of it and can't objectively judge it; because it is larger than they are and therefore they project god-like size to it; etc.). This may help them to rationalize conspiracy theories which would require nigh-unfathomable resources, where "everyone is in on it." In fact, this conspiracy may simply reflect the power system that they are not a part of, which would again allow them to accept that "everyone is in on it."

Further, disenfranchised groups may be more likely to accept conspiracy theories like this, where there is not a shred of evidence and everything "logically" must be "covered up" because historically their voices have not been heard. So they don't find it so unreasonable that other voices have been silenced by "the Man" or whatever.

Well, that's a enough mindless speculation based on a single incident.... Besides, we all know that belief in conspiracy theories are caused by bumper stickers.
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If you're not part of the solution...

The local paper had an insert today for the Flintstones Creation "Museum", in anticipation of their dinosaur exhibit opening July 4:

As my brother noted, they seem to be really stressing dinosaurs, perhaps to disassociate themselves from the real lunatics.

What really offended me was that they've gotten deals with various hotels that will offer reduced rates if you mention the "museum":

Country Inn & Suites, Drawbridge Inn, Sheraton, Courtyard Marriott, Hyatt Place, are rewarding indoctrinating people with the belief that the universe is only 10,000 years old by offering them reduced rates. Possibly more than those; their website lists a few other hotels on its website, telling people to "Be sure to ask for the 'Creation Museum' rate."

On the positive side, two of those coupons are discounts to establishments inside the "museum" itself: Noah's Café and the Dragon Hall Bookstore.

And as an aside, I am bemused by the notion of biblical literalists advertising that they are open 7 days a week.
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It's not just Kentucky

Oh good. Maybe this will deflect some of that mockery towards Canada:

Compared with the $27 million (13.6 million pounds) Creation Museum that just opened its doors in Kentucky, Canada's first museum dedicated to explaining geology, evolution and paleontology in biblical terms is a decidedly more modest affair.

The Big Valley Creation Science Museum, which opens next week, was built for C$300,000 in the village Big Valley, Alberta, population 308, a two-hour drive northeast of Calgary.

The Canadian museum features displays on how men once walked among dinosaurs, a giant model of Noah's Ark, a set of English scrolls tracing the family of King Henry VI back to the Garden of Eden, and an interactive bacterial flagellum.

...

The opening of the Petersburg, Kentucky, museum has attracted the ire of scientists and moderate Christians who object to a museum that teaches that the Earth is 6,000 years old.

The Big Valley museum has been more low key, with a few stories in local newspapers discussing the facility.

The museuem "attract[s] the ire of scientists", and evolution and the age of the earth are merely "widely accepted view[s]" that this institution is going to "contest." It all sounds so genteel and civil, doesn't it? I wonder if journalists have to undergo special lobotomies to remove the parts of their brain that let them use harsh language and write articles explaining that there really is an objective reality with facts, and that some people can simply be wrong. I'd like to think that the world now would be a better place if journalists didn't simply act as stenographers for whomever they talked to and actually did something to verify or contradict their claims. If only they could do something as simple as this.
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New word for us mean old "evilutionists"

My local paper had a wonderful editorial a few days ago about Ken Ham's creationist museum in Kentucky.

Predictably, it got the rabble roused.

The fuss over the new Creation Museum reminds one of Barney Fife rushing out to "nip crime in the bud."

Surely, a small museum in a small state couldn't destroy the evoluters' 100-year-old futile effort to find missing links, because there are none.

It is also reminiscent of Gamaliel's response to the Sanhedrin's effort to stop the early Christian movement: "If this be the work of men, it will come to nought: but if it be of God, you cannot overthrow it" (Acts 5:38-39).

All I can think is... "evoluters"? I was just getting used to "evolutionist" as the meaningless label used to taunt people who accept science and reality (and of course "evilutionist", its charming, in-bred cousin), and now they're throwing a new one at us!

But really, what on earth is an "evoluter"? Somebody who "evolutes"? I think it's clear that this particular letter-writer never did.
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Fun with footnotes

Footnotes and endnotes are useful things for people engaged in research--I read the endnotes of my books obsessively and often try to track down any reference material that I think might be interesting. But they can also be horribly abused in any number of ways.

You can cite something which does not appear to exist. You can cite something that nowhere says anything like you claim it does. You can cite something that has been thoroughly debunked and repudiated as shoddy scholarship. And so on. Still, the presence of footnotes gives your paper a form of legitimacy in the eyes of those too lazy to actually read the footnotes or follow up on them.

Today I was shown, via Ex-Gay Watch, perhaps the most flagrant abuse of footnotes ever.

Here's the beginning of an FAQ on the website of Exodus International:

Note the use of footnotes. Surely this is some scholarly work!
Well... here's the footnotes themselves:

That's right. They just leave the footnotes blank, I suppose hoping that no-one with a critical eye would scroll down to the bottom of the page.

[Edit] The FAQ in question has been removed.
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